With exports in doubt because of hurricane damage to grain elevators near New Orleans, prices for corn, soybeans and wheat, the most widely planted U.S. crops, fell to their lowest levels in several weeks in futures trading on Tuesday. The fall harvest will begin soon and could glut the U.S. market if foreign sales are disrupted.
Cargill reported “significant damage” to an elevator about 30 miles upstream on the Mississippi River from New Orleans; Cargill has another elevator near New Orleans. Exporter CHS said its grain facility may lack power for weeks while Bunge and ADM were assessing damage to their export facilities, reported Reuters. About 60 percent of U.S. corn and soybean exports are shipped from the Gulf Coast, it said.
“We’re going to be talking about Ida and what damage was done across the central Gulf Coast for a long time,” USDA meteorologist Brad Rippey told the department’s radio news service. “We know that there has been catastrophic damage across southeastern Louisiana, and some of the damage and power outages extending into southwestern Mississippi.” Rippey told USDA radio news that salt water intrusion might damage crops, such as sugarcane, and pastures in southeastern Louisiana.
Hurricane Ida “moved through the eastern side of southern Louisiana’s sugarcane production area, shortly before harvest was due to begin. In addition, Ida battered some row crops, including maturing rice and open-boll cotton, in the southern Mississippi Delta,” said the USDA’s Weekly Weather and Crop Bulletin.
Grain trader Al Kluis said the market “is very concerned with possible export sale slowdown due to potential problems at the port of New Orleans.”